Eat Your Yard!

Empowerment through food cultivation and community togetherness. If I tried to list all of the reasons why you (omniscient, myself included) should grow your own organic food, It'd be so long it'll crash your browser loading. This post strays a bit from our usual art / photo related posts but we hope you'll find it relevant. Leanne and I are finally digging up the crabgrass around the front of the house and taking back the space, so we can grow our own fresh herbs and veggies. I promise I will post regular updates with photos and advice charting our learning and progress. There is a chance I'll start up a separate cooking + gardening blog .... but for now this is it! 

"Food Not Lawns"

-Paul

Scott McFarland at Regen Projects

Quite possibly one of my greatest inspirations right now. Scott McFarland is back with another show show at Regen Projects in LA. I was absolutely floored by the last show, his prints are huge and tirelessly full of digitized detail. Check him out online and meet me there if you can! Opening weeking is May 23rd till July 3rd ... I may not make it to the opening (should be climbing in J-tree) but I'll surely go later in the week.

Review snippet from 2007's exhibition: 

"This aura of distension runs throughout McFarland’s second solo exhibition at Regen Projects. Yet it is an affect produced not by the camera’s chance snapshot but by deliberate digital depiction. McFarland doesn’t hide the fact that his images are digital fabrications, and his aesthetic enhances the premeditated manner of his compositions. McFarland’s subjects – public parks, botanical gardens, zoos – further emphasize the young photographer’s interest in creating a sense of unease with the artificiality of digital imagery. His photographs depict the world as arbitrarily structured around empirical categorization."

A few pics of Leanne from our Honeymoon

So I posted these along with our wedding photos back in October ... so some of you may have seen them already. But for those who haven't, I just have to share (!). It's kinda strange because we didn't photograph our own wedding (yeah, I was asked if I would about a thousand times 

?) but we certainly couldn't go through the whole experience without instinctively grabbing a camera and firing away. Our honeymoon in Paris proved to be a pretty ideal location (you know, it's scenic, i guess :). It wasn't until the last day before our flight home that we mustered the courage to get dressed up in our wedding garb and go out to the incessantly populated Eiffel Tower for pictures. We found ourselves with a little extra time so we taxi-ed it over to a secluded little spot on Isle-de-la-Cite near la Notre Dame. Doesn't Leanne look amazing! She did her own hair and make up before the shoot (I think we have a renaissance wedding vendor on our hands). The last photo was in the Metro. Not the best method of transportation when you are wearing a wedding dress.

For the photo-nerds out there ... I left my digital at home so I could focus on my personal work while in Paris (two week honeymoon, there's only so much loungin' and lovin' one can do). I needed to shoot, so I strayed from my usual color partiality and threw in a few rolls of Ilford 3200 which I overexposed about a stop. Scans are straight from the neg. 

Au revoir et a bientot mes amies !!

-Paul

In the Darkness we seek light..

Paul, Chris Smith and I, all decided to go out and explore last wednesday night. I am very intrigued with the night, and the industrial landscape. For the past year I have been working on a series of paintings in this specific genre. 

Needing to add to my collection of reference on the subject, and needing a new photo adventure to partake in, the three of us decided to take our cameras out on a journey.

The smell of chemical filled the air, and the cold wind chilled our cheeks. The city was beautiful and dark. The silhouettes of birds dangling from wire reminded us that we were not alone. 

~Leanne

Here are a few of my paintings. 

You can view more of my work at leannesargeant.blogspot.com/

Kha+Minori : Long Beach

So after a few rescheduled cold days, we finally got to shoot with Kha and Minori! We started out at Tantalum Restaurant in Long Beach because they not only got engaged here 4 years ago, but go here for a bite and a drink every year on their anniversary. It holds a special place in their hearts (mine too now ... their draft beer selection and happy hour are both amazing :). The weather seemed to sneak brisk winds because it was still pretty chilly for a Sunday in April. After the restaurant we ventured under PCH and ended up in the Bixby oil ranch ... which provided an amazing backdrop of stormy skies and an industrial horizon!

Albums!

Ahh.. The final product. The treasured heirloom that will be looked at for many years to come. The Album is the lasting element of your wedding that you can look back on to re-live all the memories and fun events that took place during your wedding day.

Here is an example of one of our Albums.

We can imprint in gold, silver, copper, black or red. With the ivory album, I think the copper goes very well!

Leather Craftsmen uses high quality pages that are durable and individually sprayed with a protective coat to keep your album looking great for many generations.

Each Album is hand designed by me and then sent to be hand bound. No two albums should ever be the same. There are no templets to follow, each design is a direct reflection of the wedding day and inspired by the couple we create it for.

We can place one, two, or three photos on the cover, centered or subtly resting in the corner ... the possibilities are endless.

Our album binder is Leather Craftsmen. Visit their website at if you are interested in seeing more cover options. They offer a variety of different colored leathers, and even Japanese Bookbinding Cloths.

If you want to see more of our albums in person just let us know and we'd be happy to set up a consultation!

~Leanne

 

Jewelry Images for Deborah at Laughing Dove Designs

I Just thought It would be fun to post something I'm working on other than weddings and portraits (although, don't get me wrong, those are my favorite images to take ... other than "tastefully artistic" nudes ... just kidding Leanne :P  ).

The project is to document a whole host of new work by our friend and fellow artist Deborah with Laughing Dove Designs. She is the one who made all of Leanne's wedding jewelry from beautiful, sustainable potato pearls. This is my bathroom-turned-photo-studio from earlier this week. Our place was built in the twenties and has amazing original arts and crafts tile work in the bathroom ... plus our vintage bottle collection added a nice touch. The final image in the set is the end product. 

-Paul

Amazing

I pulled this image off of BBC's news site like 3 months ago and have been waiting impatiently to share it with everyone. I think the blog is a pretty good way to disseminate it. An image like this reminds me of how everything in nature is connected and shares a common build. Its only a matter of how close you look till you see patterns reoccurring everywhere. Amazing.

-Paul

Mike+Debbie : Engagement Session in Palos Verdes

Another fabulous shoot on a sunny Saturday in March. We officially have a new favorite location for photographing couples and portraits. There's a stylish little plaza near the center of Palos Verdes that reminds me of a tiny hilltop town in Tuscany. With tons of old brick walls and over-grown alleys, there was no shortage of great backdrops for shooting. Kudos to Mike and Debbie for putting up with our (by our I mean Leanne's :) incessant dragging around to every courtyard and stairwell in the whole town! Can't wait for their wedding this June ... they were referred to us by Dana and Sean Icaza, so if their wedding even slightly compares, I know it'll be wild!

**Second to last photo is Leanne caught in action (should I have been holding the reflector instead of shooting that one?)**